What's Your Excuse?

I received a reviewer's copy of The Forbidden Book of Getting What You Want by J.K. Ellis this week.

Ellis is really swimming against the current tide with this one in that it promotes an attitude of personality responsibility and getting past EXCUSES when pursuing the kind of life you desire.

This is in stark contrast to a slew of self-help works of late that maintain that somehow you will be rewarded for wishful thinking without any further effort on your part-a recipe for disaster in many cases. Yes, it is helpful to create a clear mental image of what you truly want, however as the old saying goes, "if you are going to grow potatoes, you are going to have to pick up a hoe!"

Experience has shown that one of the best ways to help people overcome motivational blocks is to convert their "whys" in to "hows."

Traditional therapy dictated that insight was an essential key to personal transformation.

"Why do I continue to smoke?"
"Why can't I stop overeating?"
"Why has success eluded me?"

Yet even if you do manage to answer these questions, what are you left with? A pile of EXCUSES! Insight is at best a starting point, it is action that will really make the difference.

Now let's take a shot at turning a why into a how. "How can I quit smoking?" suggests that you can quit smoking, it is just a matter of figuring HOW. "Why can't I quit smoking?" implies that you can't and encourages you to search for an EXCUSE.

The Forbidden Book is based on the premise that when you accept personal responsibility and let go of of EXCUSES and blame, you create a kind of trap that forces you to succeed. A really good quote from the section on excuses goes"

"Life is not based on the quality of your EXCUSES!"

And there really is no excuse not to learn more about the Forbidden Book either!